This invention relates to duplicating and especially to means for multiplying the output of existing lithographic duplicators of the type used in offices and in-house duplicating departments, particularly when reproducing multipage documents. It deals primarily with the problems of how to rapidly prepare multipage masters, and especially how to prepare such masters so that they can be used in a routine sequence which will generate copy sheets capable of being directly collated in a manner to produce finished copy or substantially finished copy.
There have recently been developed duplicators with on-line master makers and collators which can accept an original and can automatically carry the production process through to the presentation of assembled sheets in the pockets of a collator. The present invention has devised special techniques for utilizing such equipment in a manner to maximize its output in terms of printing more than one page per impression, and especially to do so even when it is desired to provide in each collator pocket a work product consisting of a set of finally ordered or substantially finally ordered pages.